


make your fingers soft and light

by LadyAlice101



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Canon Divergent, F/M, from s6? kinda, i have no witty tags for this one folks, imma just let this fic speak for itself, mentions of previous abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-25
Updated: 2019-09-25
Packaged: 2020-10-28 01:49:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,853
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20770541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyAlice101/pseuds/LadyAlice101
Summary: Jon goes quiet again, and his hand retracts, but just as quickly he is touching her again, oil on his fingers. He works methodically, moving from one wound to the next, one scar to another, from the base of her back to the top of her spine. It’s so gentle, so caring, and the longer it goes on the more Sansa relaxes, the safer she feels. Her eyes dip close under his rhythmic ministrations, and her mind goes blank, and she starts to feel the familiar lull of sleep edge around her mind.“This is supposed to make the scars fade?” Jon asks as he finishes up, his warm hands leaving her back, making her feel cold and startling her from her reverie.“Yes.”She isn’t sure she imagines the tightness in his voice when he speaks again. “If you are to do this every night, then I will gladly assist you.”//Jon rubs a soothing balm into Sansa's scars every night.But that's it. Nothing more. Definitely not. He's just there to help her do what she can't do herself.





	make your fingers soft and light

**Author's Note:**

> i have so many essays to write for uni, but then my fingers slipped and i wrote this instead 
> 
> unbeta'd as always
> 
> enjoy! xx

_Take it easy with me, please_

_Touch me gently like a summer evening breeze_

_Take your time, make it slow_

_Andante, Andante_

_Just let the feeling grow_

_\- Andante, Andante _

**the day after sansa stark arrives at castle black **

Her skin pulls harshly, tight and taut, stinging and throbbing, as if she needs the reminder of her wounds. Jon’s cloak sits warmly across her shoulders as she waits for him to return.

A mug of ale is cradled between her hands. She’s not touched it so far, but she’s starting to shiver from the cold and the trembles are pulling against her wounds. Sansa takes a shallow pull from the flagon, hoping the burn of it might warm her, but it just makes her cough like it had yesterday, further aggravating her skin.

Jon raps against the door, then enters the Lord Commander’s chambers, jar in hand.

“Supper will be ready soon,” Jon tells her, extending his hand to pass her the pot.

She’s glad that he doesn’t bring up the real reason he’s here.

He’d taken her dress yesterday when she’d removed it to bathe, lending her a set of his own clothes to wear while hers were being cleaned, and he’d come into the chambers while the tub was being removed. She has no doubt that he’d seen how much blood had been drenched into both.

Before she’d gone to sleep last night, Jon had quietly offered to go to the maester and ask him for a poultice. She declined at first, but under his imploring gaze she’d agreed.

“Okay,” she says softly, staring down at the jar. Should she put it on now? Or wait until bed?

“I’ll be outside,” Jon says, and she’s not sure she’s imagining the awkward edge to his voice or not. “We’ll go to dinner together when you’re ready.”

He departs as quickly as he came, leaving Sansa with ruined skin and a jar of poultice that’s supposed to put her back together.

Sansa doesn’t need to have learnt what she’s learnt to know that that’s never going to happen, no matter what medicine she holds in her hand.

She uses almost the whole jar, rubbing poultice onto her bleeding toenail beds, the cuts on her thighs, the bite mark on her breast, the slices on her arms. But when she reaches her back, Sansa can’t reach the cuts without pulling against them. Two of them need to be restitched, but she definitely can’t do that herself, like she had the one on her stomach and leg last night.

Sansa purses her lips, staring over her shoulder into the small looking glass to look at her back. She could get Brienne to help, but Sansa has thus far avoided telling the woman the extent of her wounds, and she feels too ashamed to do so now. The maester would likely help, but Sansa balks at the idea of having an unknown man’s hands on her back.

The only other option is Jon.

The floor creaks under her steps as she goes to the door, uncertainty making her bite her lip.

Jon will do it if she asks, Sansa knows. She knows without a doubt. His brows will likely crease, and his face will pull down in a solemn stare, and likely he’ll ask if he wants her to fetch Brienne instead, but all she’ll have to do is frown and shake her head and he’ll step inside and help her.

She doesn’t have to have known him intimately as a girl to see that he’ll help her with such a simple task, and she doesn’t have to know him intimately as a woman to see that his hands would never move from the cuts, his gaze would never stray from the task.

Sansa hesitates before the closed door, wondering if she has the courage to ask him to do something so against propriety.

Outside, Jon’s voice rumbles lowly, and she realizes he’s talking to someone.

Sansa backs away from the door, and wraps a cloth around her back and stomach and hopes that that will do.

**the night sansa stark and jon snow win back winterfell **

The night is both joyous and somber, as only a night immediately following a battle can be.

Ramsay Bolton’s death sits heavily in her gut, and Sansa skips supper in favour of sitting in front of her fire, eyes suspiciously dry.

Jon finds her there, and if she expects him to be drunk, then she’s pleasantly surprised. He joins her silently, skin scrubbed clean and adorned in fresh leathers. Neither of them speak, but Sansa finds gratitude welling up in her throat so viscerally that before she knows it a thank you is spilling from her lips.

Jon looks completely startled, and he blinks slowly, as if he can’t quite comprehend what she’s said.

“What for?” he asks, obviously perplexed. “I feel like I owe you an apology, Sansa, rather than you owing me your gratitude. You should never have been treated the way you have been, and I should have come for you much sooner. Or at all, really.”

“And be executed as traitor?” Sansa asks, fighting the urge to roll her eyes. “Yes, you would have done me a favour by gifting me the sight of your head rolling on Winterfell’s stone.”

Jon purses his lips, hands hanging clasped between his thighs. “If I don’t owe you an apology, then you don’t owe me a thank you.”

The idea chafes at her, but Sansa decides to leave it.

“We’re to have a meeting with the Lords on the morrow, after we break our fast,” Jon informs her. “Sleep well, Sansa.”

He stands, groaning as he does so, and Sansa rises to her feet quickly.

“Are you sore?” she asks, before she realizes that that might be an odd question. He shoots her a curious look, and she rushes to add, “Your muscles, I mean . . . that is to say, do they feel . . . are you . . .”

He raises a brow, a good natured chuckle accompanying his fond look.

“I’m alright,” he assures her. “Just a bit stiff, is all.”

“Did you have a bath?” she asks, rather stupidly, because _obviously _he’s had a bath, as he isn’t covered in grime from the battle any longer.

“Aye,” he says, as if it isn’t obvious, which sooths the awkward lump in Sansa’s throat. “It helped somewhat, but I’m a bit tense again. I’ll be alright in a few days I expect.”

Sansa thinks of her own muscles, of the relief she gets every night when she rubs oil over her healing wounds. She does it to help heal the still tender and fleshy cuts, but the massage is always a welcome effect.

“I can help,” Sansa offers.

Heat floods her cheeks as soon as her mouth closes, and Jon stares at her like she’s gone mad. She purses her lips then turns on her heel, walking with sure steps. She returns, oil in hand.

Jon is rocking on his heel, hands twitching by his side as his eye flick from her and to the door.

Getting him on the bed would be easier, of course, but she herself hardly thinks that’s a good idea, so she doubts she would be able to convince him to do so. Hiding her embarrassment with determination, Sansa puts the oil on the sitting table between the lounges then stands before Jon and undoes the buckle of his sword belt.

He inhales sharply, then his hands fly to her wrists and tighten around them like manacles.

“What are you doing?” he demands.

“I’ll give you a massage,” Sansa says, like it’s the most natural thing in the world. Truthfully, though, if she weren’t so stubborn she most assuredly would have fled this situation by now. “Mother used to it for father, when he came back after weeks gone.”

“Aye, but I’m not your lord husband, Sansa. This isn’t proper.”

There’s a hard edge to his tone, but she can’t quite make out the reason for it. He’s not angry with her, that’s plain to see, but there’s a strangled quality to his voice that confuses Sansa.

“Aye, and I’m not your wife, but I can still help my brother with his aching muscles, can’t I?”

Jon swallows, grip tightening on her wrists for a moment, and then he drops her hands. His arms fall to the side, and Sansa realizes that he’s going to let her do what she wants.

“Sit,” she instructs, picking up the jar again.

Jon’s lips twitch, but only a second later he starts to unlace his doublet. He removes his tunic next, and when he’s left in his undershirt his eyes find hers.

He opens his mouth, likely to ask if she’s sure, but that question seems too loaded. Of course she’s not sure, but if he asks then she’ll have to say yes or no.

So she sticks with her stubbornness, and before he can ask she says, “Undershirt as well.”

Their gaze is broken by the wool of his shirt lifting over his head. Sansa’s eyes are immediately drawn to his chest, wounds pocked across his skin. They’re deep and dark, ugly and unhealed, and Sansa’s hand tightens on the jar.

“Do they hurt?” she asks, caught on the one across his heart.

“No,” he replies, voice deep and rough. “I can’t feel them at all.”

“At all?” she repeats, looking up to his eyes.

He shakes his head.

Sansa lifts the jar of oil, finger circling the lid of it slowly.

“I use this on my scars,” Sansa tells him quietly. “It makes them hurt less, and fade easier. I intended to use it to massage your back, but I could put in your scars, if you like.”

Sansa doesn’t really think it will work for him like it does for her, and he likely doesn’t either, if the downturn of his lips is anything to go by.

And yet, Jon nods, and sits on the lounge, chest bared for her. His eyes follow her closely as she pulls her skirts up so she can take a seat next to him, knee and thigh pressed tightly to his.

Sansa dips her fingers into the oil, then balances the pot on her lap. She avoids his eye steadfastly, and with a surety she doesn’t feel, Sansa presses her hand to one of the less grisly wounds.

Jon inhales sharply, his muscles contracting under her touch, and Sansa immediately pulls away.

“Did I hurt you?” she asks.

Jon breathes deeply for a few moments, his eyes tightly shut, and then on a ragged exhale he says, “No. Keep going.”

His eyes don’t open, and lacking any other explanation from him, Sansa starts again. His muscles flutter underneath her oiled touch, but instead of pulling away this time, she keeps going, dragging her fingers around the edges of the unhealed gouge. He shudders yet again, but still doesn’t ask her to stop, and so on she goes, from one wound to the next, wondering whether to dip her fingers into the black dent. They wouldn’t look like this if they’d been stitched, but why would they have been? He’d died from these gashes, and when he’d come back to life it must have fallen to the back of everyone’s mind.

And now he’s left with such unnatural marks to remember his brothers’ betrayal.

Sansa doesn’t mind them, in all honestly, as even though they’re rather gory, all they do is remind her that she could have lost him before she even had him. But she knows how much she hates her own healing cuts that will turn to scars, or even the pale scars she harbours from her time in King’s Landing.

Sansa doesn’t know how long she spends rubbing his torso, but eventually Jon catches her wrist. She looks up to his face, startled, and he’s staring at her with earnest eyes. She had no idea how long he’s been staring at her, but by the way his thumb caresses the skin of her inner wrist she thinks it might have been a little while.

“You do this to yourself this every night?” he murmurs.

Sansa bites her lip, wondering if she’s going to admit the truth to him. The truth being, of course, that Sansa isn’t stupid: she’ll have to marry again eventually. And if she’s to suffer such an indignity again, she won’t have it made worse by being forced to marry some small Lord with big dreams of getting his hands on Winterfell, which is what she’ll be left with if she can’t even offer a nice sight for a man to lay his eyes upon.

“Yes,” she answers finally, deciding not to tell him all that. “Most of my body, except my –“

His dark eyes watch her carefully, and Sansa bites her lip and turns away. She wonders what might be different between them, if that second night at Castle Black she’d asked him to tend to her marred skin.

“Except your?”

She knows he’ll offer. There is absolutely no way he _won’t, _not now she’s sat here for several minutes, caring for his own scars. So does she say it? Does she finish the sentence, knowing that he will then offer, knowing that she will then have to answer?

“My back,” she tells quietly, eyes falling to his bare chest. “Except my back. I can’t reach.”

He doesn’t rush to offer, but his fingers still their exploration of her wrist.

She wonders if he’ll ask whether Brienne has done it, or whether she will get Wolkan to do it now she has access to a maester again. She knows Wolkan well at this point, he having taught her how to stitch her own wounds and giving her poultices and he’d even got his hands on some moon tea for her once or twice, risking his own life in the process.

But Jon proves how well he’s come to know her – or perhaps he just knows how he deals with his own trauma and is applying it to her as well – because all he says is, “I’ll do it for you. If that’s alright.”

He doesn’t _ask, _which is somehow relieving. If he’d asked if she wanted it, she would have had to consider it, would have to actively make a decision – and thus far she’s proven that she doesn’t necessarily make the choice that helps her injuries. But this way he’s not asking if she wants him to, he’s asking if she’ll grant him permission.

It’s so much easier to say yes.

Sansa nods, then shifts on the chair, turning so her back faces him. She hears Jon move behind her, and then he’s tugging on the laces of her dress. He’s quick and efficient, but not rough, and he graces his palms over her shoulders enough to sooth her. She’s not been wearing a corset, because it’s too painful, so once her dress is open it’s just her shift that’s in the way.

Sansa swallows deeply, then says, “Just – hold on a moment –“

She tugs her arms from the sleeves of her dress, and then wiggles around so she can maneuver the shift off without removing her dress. Once it’s over her head she drops it to the ground, then immediately she pulls the front of her woolen dress up to cover her chest. She wonders for a vague moment whether he’d caught sight of something he shouldn’t have, but decides that that’s a thought best left unexplored.

Jon doesn’t gasp, like she might have expected, or make any noise of distress at all, really, which makes Sansa think that maybe it’s not as bad as she thinks it is.

But then his fingers lightly skim underneath one of the wound she shouldn’t have left open, one she should have gone to somebody about, one that is still trying to heal even though she’s not helping her body at all, and he says, “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“We had other things to worry about.”

She doesn’t hear anything from behind her, no movement, no breath.

“Sansa.”

She lets out a shuddering exhale.

“Please listen to me when I say: _you _are what I worry about. This battle, taking back Winterfell, none of it would have been worth a damn to me if not for you. I am only here for you. All I want is to keep you safe, and that means from things like this as well.”

Jon goes quiet again, and his hand retracts, but just as quickly he is touching her again, oil on his fingers. He works methodically, moving from one wound to the next, one scar to another, from the base of her back to the top of her spine. It’s so gentle, so caring, and the longer it goes on the more Sansa relaxes, the safer she feels. Her eyes dip close under his rhythmic ministrations, and her mind goes blank, and she starts to feel the familiar lull of sleep edge around her mind.

“This is supposed to make the scars fade?” Jon asks as he finishes up, his warm hands leaving her back, making her feel cold and startling her from her reverie.

“Yes.”

“And you’re doing that for your comfort?” Jon asks, and Sansa goes still. “You aren’t doing it because you think they make ugly, are you?”

Sansa doesn’t reply, but that’s likely answer enough.

She isn’t sure she imagines the tightness in his voice when he speaks again. “If you are to do this every night, then I will gladly assist you.”

It’s a choice, as it always is with Jon, and if she truly didn’t want him to then she knows he would never bring it up again. But again he’s not putting her in the position in which she has to make a choice; all she has to do is accept his offer.

“Yes,” she agrees. “Yes, that would be good.”

It’s easy to tell herself that she needs the help. The scars are ugly, and she does need to do what she can to make herself desirable, and Jon is offering her a very easy solution.

She’s not agreeing because she liked having his hands on her. She’s not agreeing because it has stirred a heat in her belly at the same time as it has soothed something raw and jagged inside her heart.

Because if that was why she was agreeing, then she would be slipping dangerously close to doing something more than just shameful, but outright sinful.

Jon stands, the lounge shifting underneath her as his weight is removed. He rests his hand against her shoulder for a moment, squeezing affectionately, and then he turns from her.

Sansa clutches her dress to her chest, fingers tightening in the wool of it. Jon doesn’t turn back to her as he bids her goodnight, and it isn’t until after he’s closed the door behind him that she realizes that must be because he’s trying to give her some privacy, the dear man. She’d taken her dress off in front of him, had exposed more of herself than she had ever willingly done so before, and still he isn’t laying his eyes upon her.

It makes her smile, only a small twitch of her lips to be true, but a smile nonetheless.

Despite herself, she looks forward to tomorrow.

**the night jon snow announces he’s going to dragonstone **

The air is tense around them as Jon tugs at her laces. It feels impatient, each pull quick and rough, but that’s not what this is.

He’s upset with her.

But she’s upset with him, too, so she’s just waiting for him to open his mouth so she can yell at him.

Despite the harsher tugs of her laces, despite the irritated way she’d tugged her shift off to bare her skin, as soon as Jon puts his hand on her back his touch gentles, his fingers probing their familiar patterns, starting at the base of her spine and working their way up. Despite herself, she can feel her muscles relaxing under his touch, and by this point they’ve done this so many times that the mere memory of the previous peace this act brings her ebbs away her anger.

About halfway through, however, he ruins it.

“I’m going, Sansa.”

Frustration wells back up in her as if it never left, and she steps out of his reach.

“You’ll die down there, Jon. You should stay here, we’ll figure out another way to fight.”

“There is no other way, Sansa,” he snaps, as angry as she is. “You _know_ this.”

“Do I?” she demands, spinning around the face him, clutching her dress to her chest. His eyes dip to where her fingers bite into her skin, her fists closed in fury and nails tugging harshly at the swell of her breast. “What I know is that two days ago we would have fought without that dragonglass, without those dragons, _without _you leaving. What we would have done then?”

“We would have lost!” he shouts, as if she doesn’t understand what that means.

“You don’t know that!”

“And you do?” he scoffs scornfully. “You don’t know a thing of war, Sansa, and –“

“Without _me, _you would have lost the Battle of the Bastards,” she sneers. “_I _won that, not you. Don’t you dare tell me I don’t know how to fight a war, Jon Snow. It’s more than going south on a fool’s errand, trying to secure an alliance that will only take away what you and I bled for. Or does that mean nothing to you? Do these scars mean nothing to you?”

She spins back around, showing him her back, as if he hasn’t stared at it every night, as if he hasn’t mapped out every inch of her skin from the nape of her neck to the swell of her bottom, as if he doesn’t know just how marred she is.

“I have more than just these, you know,” she continues, seething, furious that he’s not responded to her. “Do you want to see them all, all the ones on my legs, on my stomach, on my breas –“

Suddenly his body is pressed against hers, his toes to her heels, his chest to her shoulders, his nose in her hair and his hands upon her waist.

“These _scars –“ _His voice breaks, chokes, and she _feels _his chest heave with a deep swallow, with the way he feebly tries to catch his breath. “These scars are the exact reason I am going. While ever I draw breath, I will not let you gain a single one more. I will not let anyone harm you, whether that be a Walker or a Targaryen. Aye, I would have fought this war without what I needed, and I would have died to protect you. We would have lost, Sansa. I would have fallen on the battlefield, put into some mass grave at the Wall and hopefully been burnt before I joined their ranks. Or I would have been slain one foot in front of you, trying to keep them away from you. They both end with me leaving you unprotected, leaving you to die. But I can change that now, Sansa, I can give us a chance, and I will not – I will _not _–“

His voice breaks off suddenly, and he draws a ragged breath as if he physically can’t finish his sentence.

Sansa feels much the same way. Her heart slams against her ribs, branding a familiar pattern that makes blood rush in her ears and her head feel dizzy. Her hands tremble where they’re perched against her chest, no longer so tightly wound and only one movement away from falling.

“I know you think I can’t protect you,” Jon says lowly, his breath hot against her ear. “But by the gods, Sansa, I will die trying my best.”

Her body shudders as she exhales deeply, leaning further back into him.

“I’m scared,” she admits quietly, closing her eyes, the base of her head resting against his shoulder. If she turned her head, even if just slightly, there would be no mistaking her intentions. Sometimes she wonders what he would do, how fiercely he would deny her, but other times, times like these, when he’s making declarations he has no business making, when he’s promising her things with words that sound like they’re out of a song, when he trembles as much as she does, when his nose nudges against her jaw as if he’s asking her to turn her head - . . . well, those times she thinks he wouldn’t deny her. He would welcome her.

“Of what?” he murmurs. “Tell me, please.”

“I don’t know,” she confesses on a whisper. There are so many things to be scared of, so many things that could go wrong, so many ways she could imminently die, and yet – “I just want you to stay by my side. I never want you to leave.”

He turns his head slightly, and then his lips whisper against the curve of her neck, brushing so lightly against her skin that she thinks she’s imagining it.

“There is nothing on this earth that can keep me from you forever,” he swears, lips moving against her and she knows she isn’t imagining it. “Not anymore.”

“You promise?” she asks, her voice more vulnerable than she’s let it be in years.

“I promise.”

Sansa takes a deep, shuddering breath, wondering if she could turn her face to him, wondering if he would return the kiss she so desperately wants to bestow upon him, wondering if his fingers would tighten against her waist, if he would spin her around so he could deepen the kiss, tilting her chin up with his knuckles, hand cupping her breast as she lets her dress fall away -

The pressure of his body suddenly disappears, and without a word she hears him retreat from her. She scrambles for something to say, tries to figure out why he’s leaving her so suddenly, but all she can think is that he must know what she wants and it’s disgusted him.

Why else would he leave without finishing? He _never _leaves without finishing.

He’s always had so much control over himself, much more than Sansa. He must be removing himself because he knows that she won’t stop, that she would condemn them both by kissing him purely because she wants it so badly.

Jon doesn’t say anything as he leaves, doesn’t even look back as he lets the door click closed.

A sob builds up in her throat, though from rejection or desperation she isn’t sure. All she knows is that the feel of his hands on her back is still so potent that it makes her womanhood ache with the need to be touched.

Sansa lays herself on her bed, hating herself all the while, then dips her fingers between her thighs and sighs her brother’s name into her pillow, and afterwards she falls asleep before the shame of it can overcome her.

**the night before jon snow leaves for dragonstone **

Sansa isn’t sure she’s imagining that he’s taking twice as long tonight, not until she sees that the candle is almost burnt down.

He rubs his hands over each scar softly, like he always does, and then he goes over each one again, and then he smooths his palms from her shoulders to her hips, probing her muscles, massaging her into submission.

By the time his hands slow, the candle wax is almost gone, and Sansa might be dozing off by now if she weren’t so aware that he’s leaving tomorrow.

Behind her, Jon sighs, and then she feels the press of his forehead against the curve of her shoulder.

“Sansa . . .”

Sansa closes her eyes, her throat burning uncomfortably. She tires to swallow it away, but it just makes tears well, and she won’t have him see that. She won’t.

When she finally thinks that she won’t burst into tears as soon as she opens her mouth, she says, “No goodbyes, Jon. Don’t make me do that.”

His voice sounds just as choked as hers when he replies. “No, I - . . . I meant what I said before. There’s nothing that will keep me from you forever.”

“She would.”

Sansa doesn’t quite know what makes her say it, why she can’t keep the vulnerability out of her voice, but it’s done now. He stills behind her, not even breathing, and then his fingers glide over the bare skin her waist, dipping just underneath the open edges of her dress.

“She _won’t_.”

His vow is punctuated by his fingers digging into her skin, but he releases her just as quickly.

“Sansa, listen to me,” he says quietly, fervently, when she starts to tremble under his touch. “You are . . . _everything _to me. I will keep you safe, I swear it.”

His lips brush against her skin, and she shudders beneath him. His breath hitches, she can feel it, and she leans back into him, turning her head, encouraging him to take the opportunity she presents, _gods _she wants him to kiss her so badly –

Jon disappears from behind her, standing abruptly.

Sansa blinks, taken aback, and turns to him with her brows pulled in confusion. “Jon, what are you –“

“I can’t,” he whispers, as if that explains anything. “We can’t, Sansa, I –“

Oh this is exactly like the last time she did this, why didn’t she learn her lesson? She’s such a stupid little girl. Feeling suddenly exposed, Sansa pulls her dress up over her shoulders, turning her head away from him and closing her eyes.

“Right,” she agrees, voice unsteady. “Of course. I shouldn’t have –“

Sansa swallows harshly, hands curling around her arms, as if she might be able to protect herself that way. She hears him move, and waits for the telltale click of the door closing, waits to feel the loneliness that she’s become so accustomed to over the years start to creep in again.

But instead she feels his fingertips brush along her jaw, his breath fan over her face, his lips against her temple.

“_Gods, _Sansa,” he murmurs against her skin. “If we could, I – you _must _know that I would, but we –“

She grips his face between her hands, nails digging into his skin, and her dress falls down further, held up by the bend of her elbows and the swell of her breasts.

“I don’t care,” she says, desperately, fervently, forehead pressed to his, wanting nothing more in the entire world than to finally get some relief and kiss him. “I don’t care, Jon, please –“

His breath hitches, and then he whimpers, and he’s going to kiss her, she knows he is, gods please let him be about to kiss her.

But his grip just loosens on her waist, and then he’s pulling away from her. She claws her fingers into his tunic, but just for a moment, because she will not be that woman that can’t stand on her own, that relies on a man to keep her strong.

She rocks on her heels as he moves out of her grasp, and then she turns from him, the dismissal clear.

He lingers for several long moments, but then he does what she first expected him to, and he leaves her alone, the way she’s grown used to.

**the night jon snow and daenerys targaryen arrive in winterfell**

Sansa bites her lip, wondering if he’s going to come tonight.

The jar of oil sits on her small dining table, taunting her with every moment that passes. Her work is spread out before her, but truthfully she hasn’t really touched it.

Her thoughts are consumed by Jon’s arrival today, by the Dragon Queen and her possessive display over Jon, by her all consuming _anger _over Jon’s apparent blatant disregard for independence and the way he’d thrown it away for a quick fuck.

Well.

Sansa likes to think she knows Jon well, and if he’s the man that she thinks he is then that’s probably not true.

But it sure seems like it.

There’s a brisk knock on the door, and then it swings open.

Jon slips inside quietly, the door clicking shut behind him. He turns to face her slowly, like he’s unsure how he’ll be received, even though he didn’t even give her the opportunity to turn him away.

His eyes fall to the jar she’s placed on the table, and his gaze lingers there for several long seconds.

“Sansa,” he greets, voice low, dragging his eyes from the pot and up to her eyes. He pinches each finger of his glove, then drops them on the table. His palm rests atop the lid of the jar, nails tapping against the neck of it.

“Jon. She let you leave so soon?”

His brows pull down.

“Oh sorry, was I supposed to ignore that she’s dictated every single thing you’ve done since you both arrived today?”

Jon gives a small, indignant shake of his head, hand tightening around the jar.

“You shouldn’t have antagonized her today,” he says.

Sansa’s eyes follow his hand as he picks up the oil, pulling the lid off it. He’s still going to do this? _Now? _

“So she brought food, then?” Sansa demands, bringing up the argument she’d started with Daenerys today, trying valiantly to keep her eyes from his hands.

Jon sighs heavily, then makes his way to stand behind her. The jar echoes as he sets it down, and then Sansa feels the heavy and insistent pressure of his hands on her shoulders, sweeping her hair away.

“No,” Jon says as he starts to undo her laces, and Sansa scrambles to remember what she asked him. “She didn’t bring anything.”

Ah, yes. Food.

She’s spent every moon since he left trying desperately to increase Winterfell’s stores, to somehow get enough grain to last through the War and winter. She’s exhausted herself and their gold trying to get it, not helped by the fact that the grain from the Reach _mysteriously _disappeared this harvest.

Stress has made her hands tremble all afternoon, and he’s going to stand here and tout Daenerys?

She stands, the laces of her dress mostly undone down her back, the neckline of it sliding over her shoulders.

“She sounds like she’ll make a great Queen for all of us,” Sansa snaps, crossing her arms under her breasts.

Jon’s eyes flick down to her chest, then back to her face.

“She . . .” He clears his throat, and shifts on his feet. Sansa’s eyes narrow slightly, and she tilts her chin up in a challenge. “She’s not . . .”

He swallows, throat bobbing with the movement. Jon’s chest heaves as he sighs deeply, then he turns from her slightly, swiping his hand over his mouth.

“Has anyone been doing this for you since I left?” Jon asks, turning back to her and taking her by the shoulder so he can spin her around.

Sansa’s breath lodges in her throat, and dimly she thinks she shouldn’t let him do this, not while they’re both so angry, not while he’s – he’s . . . warming another woman’s bed.

Oh how she’d wanted him to be different.

She slides out from under his hands, clenching her hand to her chest and taking a deep breath before she turns to him.

“I don’t think you should do this tonight,” Sansa says, trying to keep her voice even. “I think you should leave, actually.”

“Sansa –“ he says, incredulous.

“Jon.” Her voice is steeled, her face hard and eyes cold. She’s not sure she’s ever spoken to him like this. Angry, to be certain, furious and passionate as well, but this - . . . this is her Lady of Winterfell voice. Her unemotional, cold voice, and Sansa knows he can’t stand it when she’s like this. His face shutters, and then goes as hard as her own when she says, “Leave. Now.”

She hasn’t stopped him from touching her since he first put his hands upon her back.

He doesn’t say another word as he gets his gloves from the table and leaves, the door slamming behind him.

**the night after jon snow has come back to winterfell**

Jon still comes the next day, and it makes Sansa’s heart flutter in her chest. There’s anger there, too, because she’d told him in no uncertain terms yesterday that he wasn’t welcome anymore, but mostly she feels . . . relieved. It feels a little like he’s choosing her, but if that were true then he never would have bent the knee in the first place.

She must stay strong. She must remember that.

No matter his sweet words, no matter that he’s here, he’s still betrayed her. He’s still given away the North for a pretty woman.

“I’ve come to massage your back,” he announces, as if she doesn’t know. As if she’ll let him.

Sansa scoffs, crossing her arms and squaring herself against him, chin raised.

“Sansa,” he says impatiently, frowning at her. “I know no one will have been doing it since I left. I want to help, please just let me.”

“You want to _help_?” she demands scornfully. “You should have thought of that before you left me here, alone, trying to clean up your messes. Instead you were off _gallivanting _beyond the Wall, making alliances with Lannisters who are never going to come through, falling into the bed of another woman! Spare me your platitudes, please.”

“If you are going to level accusations at me, at least make them accurate,” he snaps, and Sansa inhales sharply at his furious tone. They know how to get under each other’s skin, know just what to say to make the other rise to an argument, but Sansa is still slightly surprised at the vehemence with which he spits his words at her. “I stood across from you in this very room and swore that I would do whatever it took to protect you. You think so little of my character that you would so easily believe that I have forsaken that vow? And for what, a pretty woman in my bed? I know the Lords don’t think much of their traitorous King, but to know that you would so easily believe my lies as well is insulting.”

“That was _six moons _ago, Jon!” She shouts at him. “You _know _me, you know my past, you have stood at my back night after night and helped soothed the scars that are evidence of what those men did to me. You expect me to _trust _you when you won’t do the same? When you send me but one letter, saying you’ve bent the knee? _That’s _what’s infuriating, Jon! You ask too much, and give nothing in return. So, no, Jon, I don’t know what the truth is. And if you want me to trust you, then speak plainly with me and treat me like your equal for once in your life!”

He doesn’t quite soften, but he doesn’t shout back her like she expected, like she wanted.

“Turn around,” he instructs softly. She glares at him, but he just shakes his head slowly, and says, “Turn around. I’ll rub in the oil, and I’ll tell you everything.”

Sansa furrows her brows, hating that’s he’s being so soft. She’s wants him to shout back her, she wants to scream and cry and pull her hair out but most of all she just wants him to be honest with her.

So she does as he asks, pulling her hair over her shoulder, and then Jon is pulling on her laces quickly, baring her shift and skin to him.

“Well?” she demands as she hears him pop open the lid of the jar, tugging on her sleeves so she can work her shift off. “Start explaining yourself then.”

She doesn’t quite lean into him as he finally puts his hands upon her bare skin, but she has to stop herself from doing so. Gods how she’s missed this, missed him, how she’s longed for his rough hands against her.

“She took my –“

The door opens abruptly. Sansa gasps, whirling around, holding her dress up. Jon steps in front of her, blocking her from the view of whomever has interrupted them.

“What’s going on in here?” Arya asks slowly, cautiously, warily.

Sansa peeks at her over Jon’s shoulder, and Arya’s eyes are locked on hers. Sansa swallows harshly, no idea what to say to explain themselves.

The truth, likely, but even then Arya will have a lot of questions – questions that are valid, and true, and ones that Sansa has both asked herself and pointedly ignored the entire time they’ve been doing this.

Arya doesn’t give them a way out, just staring at them both, waiting from them to explain themselves.

“We were – arguing . . .” Jon says lamely.

Sansa rolls her eyes, then discreetly tries to pull her dress up over her shoulders. Pointless, of course, because Arya’s keen eyes have already seen her bare skin, and they track her movements now.

“And that somehow ended with Sansa undressed?”

“I’m not _undressed,” _Sansa says indignantly, dress shrugged over her shoulders now.

“I don’t know what’s going here, and _fuck _I hope it’s not what I think it is, but I could hear you two shouting from down the hall.”

Sansa’s cheeks burn, and she presses a hand to one side of her face, trying to cool herself down.

“We’ll keep that in mind,” Jon says tersely.

Arya’s lips purse together tightly and she looks over them both with knowing and distressed eyes.

Jon doesn’t try to placate her, and Sansa, for once in a very long time, has no idea what to say either. Arya doesn’t impart any words upon them, but she gives them a withering glare, and then turns on her heel to leave.

When the door closes behind her, Sansa feels like she’s been doused with cold water. Arya’s presence has belatedly reminded Sansa why this is so wrong, so shameful, why Jon has resisted her for so long and why they could _never _give in to what has been brewing between them.

Jon turns back around to her, then scrubs his palm across his jaw. He looks as though he intends to go back to doing what he was before the interruption, and Sansa straightens her back. She clenches her jaw, and tries to draw an air of indifference around her.

If she tells him not to do it, she’ll need to explain why. And that will mean finally verbalizing what she feels for him, and how little restraint she has.

So she’ll let him do it tonight, but this is the last night she will. She’ll hear out what he has to say, what explanation he has for his behavior, but after tonight he won’t again be let into her chambers so he can sooth her muscles and scars and mind.

**the night before jon snow leaves for king’s landing **

Jon hasn’t come to her chambers to massage her back since the night Arya interrupted them.

He’d explained to her, in quite a detailed manner, the deception he’d laid upon Daenerys while he’d been on Dragonstone. It hasn’t made her stress any lighter, hasn’t made her workload any less – in fact it’s only increased it – but at least she knows that he hadn’t betrayed her. That he had listened to her advice, that he hadn’t just laid with another woman because he found her irresistible.

Still, she hadn’t been able to let him come back, telling him instead that she would seek the help of Wolkan, and she thinks that that, more than anything, has been the reason behind their strained relationship.

Before, when they’d disagreed and argued over how to run the North and Winterfell, they’d never ended a day without talking over their arguments. He always came to help her at night, and they would be able to calmly talk through each of their sides and come to an agreement.

Now they just argue all day, about the strategy for the Long Night, about the North bending the knee, about food and supplies, about the best way to handle Daenerys, about his impending journey South.

About whether to tell Daenerys of his true parentage.

That last point has been a particular point of contention between them, and Sansa can admit, if only to herself, that she has pushed so hard against him telling anybody because the more they acknowledge that he isn’t Ned Stark’s son, the more acceptable her feelings become.

The more she’ll start to think she might be able to act on her perversions, and that’s dangerous thinking.

So Jon hasn’t been joining her at night, and their relationship has been suffering because of it.

But he’s leaving tomorrow, and perhaps it’s foolish of her to hope that he’ll defy her instructions and come anyway, but she does. Gods she wants so desperately to see him before he leaves, see him privately and bid her goodbyes because she has such a terrible feeling about him going South.

When the knock on her door does finally come, she’s ready for bed, her hair braided loosely down her back and in a thick woolen night dress. The fire has been stoked and her bed turned down by her handmaiden, and Sansa had been just about to blow out the candles and slip into bed.

Sansa knows its Jon, because Ghost whines and paws at the door. She opens it widely, letting him in without a word, then pokes her head out into the corridor to see if anyone is out there. Satisfied that no one saw him enter her chambers, Sansa closes the door, then lifts the bar down.

When she turns around, Jon is watching her with keen eyes.

“I’ve not come to hear you tell me you don’t want me to go,” Jon warns.

Sansa runs her thumb over the door handle and licks her lips. Jon’s gaze follows the movement, and Sansa does it again, testing what he’ll do. He stays where is, but his eyes go unfocused, his tongue darting out to run along his plump bottom lip.

“I didn’t bar the door so I could yell at you in peace,” Sansa says finally, letting her hand drop to her side.

“Sansa,” Jon murmurs, and she can’t quite tell if it’s a warning or invitation.

“If you don’t want to hear me say that which you’ve declined from me before, then you should leave,” Sansa says. “But if you want me like I want you, if you’re done denying me, then I don’t want to waste this time asking you not to go, when I know you will.”

Jon’s eyes flutter closed, and he rocks on his heels. Sansa can’t help but wonder what he’ll do. She thinks she knows how he feels, she thinks he’s made his feelings clear at this point, but he’s turned her away when she didn’t think he would before.

When he opens his eyes, she can see that he’s made his choice. He takes determined steps towards her – or to the door? – but then he says, “I’m done denying you,” and his hands sweep into her hair, thumb cupping her jaw, and he presses his lips to hers in a searing kiss.

He corners her against the wall, groaning into her open mouth. Sansa gasps, completely overcome already, and he uses the opportunity to slip his tongue into her mouth, licking a line up her tongue then nipping her bottom lip.

One of his hands drops to her waist, arching her back so that her hips rock into his. Sansa moans as he presses one of his thighs between hers, his other hand fisting in her hair and tugging her head back. A whine slides from her throat as he leaves her lips to mouth at her neck, sucking and laving and making Sansa lose her mind.

She’s hardly aware of the begs that fall from her, her _please Jon more_’s and her _gods yes right there_’s and her _oh that feels so good_’s, but each time she says something Jon grows more insistent, more impatient, until he’s guiding her to buck against his leg and he’s kissing her neck so fiercely he’s going to bruise her.

Sansa finds she doesn’t care at all.

“Gods, Sansa, you have no idea how hard it was, standing behind you every night and touching you but not being allowed to _touch _you.”

As if to punctuate his point, he spins her around, guiding her hands to the wall and then sliding his own down her sides to grip her hips. He presses his hips into her backside, and she can feel his hardening length against her.

Around a gasp she says, “You can now, Jon, please, I need you to touch me.”

He pulls apart the laces of her dress quickly, his efficiency borne from a familiarity of doing so. It makes her belly feel warm at the thought, an ache settling in her cunt as she realizes that finally, _finally, _he’s not just taking apart her dress to touch her and then stop.

Jon wastes no time sliding his hands and lips down her spine once her nightdress is open for him, and Sansa shudders under the delicious dichotomy of it all: the feather light caresses of his lips, and the determined and greedy grip of his fingers. He says nothing, but spins her back around and before Sansa can even realize he’s done so, Jon catches her lips with his own in another bruising kiss. She’s helpless against his ministrations, absolutely melting against him, but she doesn’t mind. Sansa has never felt this way before, never felt such all consuming desire and she’s never had it be stoked so thoroughly (or at all), and especially not in a way that has her knees so weak she would fall to the ground if not for his arm about her waist.

When Jon pulls away from her, Sansa whines lowly, tugging desperately at his hair and trying to guide him back to her lips, but Jon takes no heed and instead bends slightly, cupping her thighs, and then he hoists her up into his arms. Sansa gasps in surprise, locking her ankles behind his back and her arms around his neck. Jon buries his face between her breasts, and even through her nightdress she can feel the heat of his breath, the pressure of his tongue.

“Gods I can’t wait to get my hands on these,” he mutters into her, and then he moves his face away and starts to walk them back.

Sansa captures his lips again as she realizes he intends to take her to bed, her palms bracketing his jaw and her fingers pulling at the curls at the nape of his neck. Before she forgets to do it, out of mind with the feelings Jon’s conjuring in her with just the insistent press of his fingers and mouth, Sansa reaches up to pull the leather cord from his hair, letting his dark curls fall loose around his face. Jon guides her into another fierce kiss, and Sansa smiles against his mouth at the feel of his hair tickling her face.

With the bed at his feet, Jon bears Sansa down onto the furs, following her as he does so, not breaking their kiss. Sansa rolls her hips upwards, desperately aching for some friction, and Jon groans into her mouth, reciprocating the movement with a thrust of his hips that has her desperately clawing at his back.

Her fingers catch on the buckles and fastenings of his leathers, and in a desperate voice she hardly recognizes, Sansa gasps, “Take these off, _now.” _

Jon backs away, fingers fumbling over the clasps of his jerkin. A smile pulls at her lips as she watches him struggle, and the longer it takes him the more desperate he becomes. Finally Sansa takes pity on him – and her own need dictates her desire to see him unclothed as soon as possible – and she sits up, reaching to help him with the jerkin. Once it’s off, Jon reaches behind his head to pull his woolen undershirt off, throwing it behind him, and then he pauses, licking his lips as he looks down at her.

“Can I take yours off?” he asks, looking her up and down, his chest heaving in deep pants, his hair mussed and lips swollen from her attentions.

Sansa wants nothing more. She nods, and he eagerly reaches to her shoulders to slip the neckline down her arms. When she’s finally bare before him, Sansa can’t help but bite the inside of her cheek, wondering what he thinks when he looks at her.

He’s seen all the scars on her back, and likely he knows those ones better than she does, but he’s never seen these. He doesn’t know the extent of her mutilation.

Jon furrows his brows, and then suddenly moves away, disappearing out the door and into her solar. Sansa’s breath hitches in her chest, and she crosses her arms over her chest, then reaches down to pick up her discarded dress to cover herself.

When Jon returns, the pot of oil in his hand, he stops in the doorway and rocks on his heels.

“Oh,” he mutters, biting his lip. “Did you . . . not want to? Should I leave?”

Sansa blinks at his earnest expression, confused at what’s just happened. She’d thought he was leaving because he was disgusted by what he’d seen, but she should have known better. Still, an uncomfortable pit has settled in her stomach now, and she turns away from him.

“Hey, hey,” Jon murmurs. He uses his free hand to cup her neck, and then he leans down to press his forehead to hers. “I’m sorry. I should have told you I was just going to get the oil.”

Sansa sighs, relieved to hear him say that that was the reason he’d left.

Jon presses a kiss to her cheek, and then her other, light kisses all over her face and then finally to her lips.

“I want to rub the ointment in over all your scars,” he reveals, nuzzling his nose into her temple. “Can I?”

Sansa’s eyes flutter shut, and her heart thuds in her chest, but she nods in agreement slowly, swallowing deeply.

“Lie back,” he instructs softly, “and roll over?”

Sansa takes a deep breath, then does as he asks, lying down and rolling onto her stomach. She crosses her arms under her head and stares at the flickering hearth. The potent smell of the oil drifts down to her as Jon takes off the lid of the jar. The bed dips as he sits down beside her, and she hears the papery sound of his hands rubbing together, warming up the oil.

Sansa closes her eyes as he places his hands upon her shoulders, gently pressing his thumbs and palms into her muscles. She relaxes under his touch almost immediately, her eyes flicking closed as he works at her steadily. His hands disappear for a moment, and then she hears him getting more oil. He restarts his attentions on her left calf, rubbing and prodding her gently, slowly moving up to her knee, and then her thigh. Her brows furrow as he works closer and closer to the apex of her thighs, fingers skimming over the crease between her leg and backside, and then he moves away from her, to her right calf.

She whimpers, shifting on the bed as she seeks some relief to the dull ache that he’s invoked.

“Stay still,” Jon tells her, and she can hear the amusement lining his tone.

Sansa grunts, but stills herself. Now that he’s moved away from her aching cunt, she can pretend to focus entirely on his hands on her calf. But eventually he moves upwards again, slowly but surely massaging up her thigh and over her bottom, rubbing the oil in slowly and smoothly. Her legs part slightly in invitation, and he takes the opportunity to slide his thumb over her wet entrance. She thinks her answering moan might encourage him, but it doesn’t.

Again he disappears, and Sansa opens her eyes, seeking him out. His expression is soft and tender as he gazes down at her, and she props her chin on her palm, gazing back at him. The small smile on her face breaks him from his reverie, and he prods his knuckle against her hip.

“Turn over,” Jon murmurs.

Sansa takes a deep, steadying breath, as much as way to stop herself from demanding he take this moment as to relax herself enough to expose herself to him again. He waits patiently for her to steel herself, and when she finally does he leans away, raking his eyes up and down her form in such an obscene way that Sansa feels the most desired she ever has.

“You are . . . the most stunning thing I’ve ever seen,” Jon declares, then kneels between her legs so he can prop his elbows either side of her and give her such a sweet and tender kiss that Sansa’s toes curl.

He pulls back away from her, and gives her a large grin as he does so. “Sorry,” he says, smiling, “I got a little carried away. I’ll go back to the massage now.”

Sansa can’t help the chuckle that bubbles from her throat, and Jon smiles even wider in response.

“Give me your hand,” he says as he pours more oil between his palms.

She places her hand in his, then closes her eyes again when his thumbs start to massage into her palm. He slides his grip down each of her fingers, then works her wrist, and forearm, and up to her biceps, finally sweeping his palms over her collarbone. She longs for him to dip a little lower, to cup her breast and tweak her nipple, but he has more self-control than he’d professed to, because he just switches to her other side and repeats all his motions but on her other arm.

This time, however, when he reaches her collarbone and puts more oil on his hands, he starts at her chest, then moves down, running over her breasts. The rough skin of his palm skims over her nipples, making her gasp, back arching slightly off the bed. He runs all the way down her stomach, hands meeting in the middle, and then slides them back up. Both hands cup her breasts, squeezing gently, moving achingly slowly but still stirring an intense heat in her belly.

Jon continues to tease her, circling and tweaking her nipples, and suddenly she has the fierce desire to have his mouth on them, sucking at her breast like a babe. He lingers over the bite mark that’s scarred onto her, left over by her ex-husband, but Sansa finds she minds less than she thought she would. His reverence and worshipful touch leaves no room for the disgust she’s so familiar with to settle, instead chased away by her overwhelming need for him.

Her whimpers and keens start to sound more clearly in the room, and just as heat starts to truly build in her belly, just as she starts to think she might actually peak just from his attention on her breasts, he leaves her _again, _only to start on her feet.

Sansa groans loudly, wondering if it would be rude to kick him in the face for teasing her so. Up her shins he goes, up her thigh, and then to the other side, and all the while she feels like she might be going mad from her need.

By the time he finally, _finally, _brushes his palm over her curls, she almost sobs from the relief of it, almost peaks immediately.

“Ah, ah,” Jon hushes, sliding his hand up to her stomach, kneading it gently.

“Jon, I swear to the gods –“

“What?” he teases. “You want me to do this?”

His fingers dip between her folds, rubbing up and down and brushing against her nub, making her whole body twitch up from the furs.

Jon presses the palm of his other hand against her hipbone, holding her steady as he continues to work at her, sliding between her folds, hands slick from the oil and how wet she is. Sansa steadily loses every thought in her mind as he circles her nub, as he rubs up and down, as he makes her feel something she’s only ever been able to make herself feel; and even then it was never as intense as this, she never craved relief as much as she does now.

When Jon slides two fingers inside her, Sansa bucks her hips off the bed, unable to stop herself. She doesn’t even spare a thought to how base it is, how wanton, how her behavior suits a whorehouse better than it suits the chambers of the Lady of Winterfell.

“Gods, you feel so fucking good, Sansa, you’re so tight around my fingers, so wet for me.”

Jon pumps his fingers in and out quickly, curling them deliciously, sliding against her walls and making her eyes roll back. Sansa’s hands curl in the furs, tug at her hair, cup her breasts; she’s unable to keep herself still, feeling so much pent up tension that she doesn’t think her body can cope. She whines and keens and gasps, and Jon encourages her each time, keeps praise spilling from his lips and making her whole body burn.

Jon curls his hand, placing his palm against her nub, fingers still inside her, but instead of thrusting them in and out, he changes to moving his hand up and down quickly, palm rubbing her nub and fingers curled inside her, continually hitting the most intense spot.

Sansa peaks so hard her back arches, her eyes roll back, her mouth parts in a silent gasp, and she see’s stars. Pleasure rolls through her entire body and her cunt clenches so hard her stomach burns.

Jon brings her down slowly, gentling his touch but not stopping completely, guiding her through aftershocks that are almost as potent as her peak. When she finally lowers her back down to the bed, sweat drips down her temple and her chest heaves with her gasping breaths.

Jon pulls his hand from her cunt, making Sansa moan with contentment in response, and then she feels him brush some hair from her damp forehead. Sansa has to go to actual effort to open her heavy eyes, so boneless and sated that she can do little more than just watch as he shifts to lay down beside her, watching her with fond eyes.

One of his fingers trails along her collarbone, slick with oil and sweat, and she uses the rhythmic draw of his fingers to slow and calm her breathing.

“I don’t think I could ever forget how beautiful you just looked,” Jon murmurs, leaning forward to kiss the curve of her shoulder.

Sansa can’t even chuckle at him she’s still so overwhelmed.

“I’ve missed our nights together,” he says, lips feathering against her skin. “You’ve been standing right beside me, but I’ve missed you so much.”

Sansa purses her lips, wondering what to say. “I thought distance would be best,” she says finally. “I thought that I was wrong for feeling the way I do, and I thought that you must know and were disgusted by me. And then you came with Daenerys, and then _Arya _– and I just. I couldn’t but help think I was wrong.”

“Sansa, gods, _no, _I had no idea, and if I had then disgust would have been the last thing I felt. I got so close, so many times, to just saying _fuck it _and kissing you like I wanted to but I – well I thought that _you _were disgusted by _me.” _

Sansa smiles, laughing lightly as she turns her head to gaze at him.

“I love you,” she tells him, somehow worrying little that it’s too much.

Jon leans over to catch her lips, brushing his fingertips down her jaw.

“I love you too,” he says against her mouth.

They kiss lazily, lovingly, for several more minutes, and each brush of their lips restores something in her than she thought long lost.

She ignores the fact that he’s leaving tomorrow, she ignores the precarious political situation they’re in, she ignores how uncertain their future is. Those are worries for later in the night. Right now, she doesn’t want to waste a single remaining second.

When Sansa’s heart has completely steadied and she can sit up, she pushes against Jon’s chest, planting his back on the furs as she rises up beside him.

Sansa reaches for the discarded jar, smirking down at him as she dips her fingers inside.

“Now,” she says, primly, properly, throwing one of her legs over his waist and straddling him while she rubs her hands together, warming the oil between them. “Let me return the favour, hm?”

**Author's Note:**

> Scream with me on tumblr if ya want @ladyalice101


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